Latest Premier League News Plus Rant About Mario Balotelli

After a day to let the occurrences #EpicSunday settle in, it is time for the renewal of the EPL Talk “Daily Ticker.” This makes the site your one-stop-shop for all things Premier League. The day’s news is all here, along with recaps of undermined matches and other happenings around the world of football. A new feature will include my Daily Rant, which should stir up passionate debate amongst you, the readers.

Stamp the Stamping Out of Football:

Mario Balotelli proved that he has no character this past weekend, as he attempted to harm Spurs midfielder Scott Parker with his boot. The controversial Italian’s effort on goal led to him being caught off balance in his side’s win at the Etihad, thus the striker landed awkwardly, however, without a shadow of a doubt, an attempt was made by Super Mario to kick Parker in the head. Shockingly, the FA is attempting to take action against the iPad addicted forward.

Not be out done by his teammate, Joelon Lescott could be looking at a four match ban as well. The Englishman threw his elbow into counterpart, Younes Kaboul’s face in City’s victory. What appeared to be accidental, was shown by video replay to be a clear attempt to injure the Kaboul. Needless to say, Balotelli and Lescott were lucky to be on the pitch after 90 minuets.

Not EPL related, but an important issue nevertheless. It will be interesting to see how Pepe’s case influences the English FA. The Spanish FA dropped charges against the ball-winning midfielder on Monday. Real Madrid’s Portuguese midfielder stomped on Lionel Messi’s hand in their 1-2 loss in the first leg of their Copa del Rey showdown. Video evidence will put the RFEF in hot water, as Jose’s man looks down to step over the little Argentine, and purposely steps on the Barcelona star, causing Messi to roll over in pain.

Premier League News:

Frank Lampard will not play against QPR when the two London outfits meet in the FA Cup, due to a calf injury. Lamps has been spotted with bandages around his left leg, as a small tear to the muscle in question has been confirmed by the team’s medics. The Chelsea man suffered the injury in the Blues’ match against Norwich at the weekend.

Robin van Persie claims that himself and manager Arsene Wenger have a sturdy relationship after the #10 displayed his outrage and disbelief that Alexander Oxlade-Chamberlain would be replaced by Andrei Arshavin. Just when the 18 year old could have helped Arsenal to victory, Wenger took the player off due to a high amount of lactic-acid in the player’s system. Arshavin was clearly a poor replacement for the Ox, as his dreadful defending led to Danny Welbeck’s 81st minute winner for Manchester United.

The man who revived Tottenham Hotspur from the bottom of the Barclays Premier League to Champions League football is being tried for not paying up his fair share to the government. His time at Portsmouth has come into question, as ex-Pompey chairman Milan Mandaric, allegedly dropped a cool $295,000 in a Monaco bank account. According to reports, the two were stuck behind bullet-proof glass today, so at least Redknapp is invincible, unlike his team’s form under pressure.

Transfer News:

Carols Tevez is still wanted by A.C. Milan.

Queens Park Rangers have failed to reach an agreement with Sau Paulo prodigy Henrique. The Brazil U-20 was not granted a work permit, due to the fact that he has not yet been capped by his country

African Cup of Nations:

Stateside, we have no legal access to the competition, which has sent shockwaves across the football world. To the day, host countries Equatorial Guinea and Gabon have pulled off stunning wins, while Zambia defeated a highly confident Senegal side, which includes Newcastle’s Demba Ba. The Ivory Coast got by Sudan with a 1-0 victory, as the “Golden Generation” had a rough start on their journey towards silverware. Yesterday, Tunisia defeated Morocco 2-1 in a western African derby. Today’s action features the Black Stars of Ghana facing Botswana and Mali taking on Guinea, before the 2nd round of the group stage commences.

The Daily Rant:

Surprise, surprise, my first victim is Mario Balotelli, and I’m sure if he were reading this piece, he would ask, “Why Always Me.” Well, Mr. Anti-Bully, you are the most hypocritical, insane player in all of English football. Antics are one thing, but negativity is another. A recent comment on the site criticized EPL Talk for not writing positive articles on Manchester City. However, are writers supposed to encourage stamping on the head of the industrious Scott Parker, or should we applaud him for arrogantly standing at the spot with his arms spread, after he scored a goal, he should never have been on the pitch to finish. The explosive striker (pun-intended) is only hurting Manchester City. He has taken away from the clubs integrity. Now below, I am sure all the City backers will respond by saying, who cares what he has done off the field, but rather that he has scored at important times against United and Spurs. However, Mario Balotelli is a professional footballer. Note that the word professional is in the job description. Is attempting to harm others adequate behavior? I think not. If I were to do what Balotelli has done at my school, I would never walk into that building again. City has talent. They do not need Balotelli. He is a virus. So City supporters, are you ready to bite the bullet and focus on long term success and a happy squad, or do you maintain the speeder is your savior?

Why is there no discussion about the depth of the FA’s hypocrisy regarding violent conduct? It would never charge and English player with the same offense (e.g., see Wayne Rooney brazenly elbowing James McCarthy last year, Wayne Rooney attempting to kick Fabricio Coloccini this year, as well as Joleon Lescott this past weekend) and even APPEALED a charge of violent conduct against one of its own players (i.e., Wayne Rooney for his kick against Montenegro). Do people inside England not see the blatant nativism? The FA is one of the worst-run governing bodies in the world.

I agree with you in general, that there is something fishy going on. But id amend it slightly. I wouldnt say they are protecting english players, but rather english players with hopes of playing for the national team. Joey Barton has been retroactively punished for violent conduct this year and last year.

As for lescott getting let off, someone on talksport (i know, not exactly a reputable source) yesterday mentioned an interesting possibility. that the FA didnt want to retroactively charge two players from the same team for actions during the same game, and just charged the player with the more blatant conduct. May not be true, but an interesting thought.

Balotelli gets a 4-match ban while Lescott gets away with it. Rooney kicks out at another international player and gets a ban and the same FA goes and appeals to reduce his ban. The FA are a bunch of clowns.

While I applaud the punishment to Balotelli I think the FA should do this on a weekly basis by reviewing games and punish more players, regardless of their nationality. Kompany gets a ban for a tackle that was questionable while Lampard and others get away with more blatant fouls. It is this type of double standards that makes the FA look like bunch of hypocrites.

On the spectrum of bad behavior – I don’t think Mario’s stomp was so bad. He was hit from behind and kicked out. Malicious, sure, worthy of a ban, probably, but I think it lacks a level of per-meditation that I’ve seen in other incidents (like Pepe stomping on Messi’s hand, for example).

Sorry, does playing for the top team in the premier league, making more money than you and speaking more than one globally recognised language not suggest that Mario balotelli has made better use of his brain than you suggest? Perhaps moreso than you have in crafting that jibe
Humor me with your response

Also, “making more money than you” is probably not a fair metric on one’s ability. At his prime, MC Hammer made more than God. I do not suppose you would rate his financial management skills, would you?

You are not really serious.
If you honestly believe that a man who has played football from a tender age cannot put on a bib then you need intervention.
It was obviously a stunt to either get media attention or to make teammates/staff laugh and guess what?
It got your attention so he must have thought it through

If you had bothered actually reading past the headlines on the fire incident, you will discover that it was his friend who accidentaly threw the fire cracker into the bathroom but hey, you’re the smart one

While I would not necessarily carry that much cash around, its none of your business its his money and there is nothing particularly stupid about keeping your own hard earned cash in your own car.

Mario is very intelligent, you should read his interviews.
He has done thinks like donating money to the needy, helping children.
Sure he has problems and he does some stupid stuff but so does every 21 year old
Don’t be a hypocrite, the only difference between us and him is that we aren’t always on camera

The replay shows him stumbling. His leg leg catches Parker in the face. That is unintentional. Balotelli swings around, and his right leg is swinging forward. Then, because Balotelli is a goon, his right leg then swings back towards Parker, and steps either on Parker’s head or neck. Had Balotelli naturally let his right leg come round, he probably wouldn’t have fallen.

Alex – Too much to say about that ridiculous post…get back on the meds.

Yes, I followed Balotelli at Inter. Does the fact that you know he played for them make you a real old school fan? Was it a jab that you think I started following the sport this year and never saw his play before? PURE COMEDY!

An idiot…not in the least. I always find it humorous when someone takes a jab at another’s intelligence but types a post with multiple spelling, punctuation, and structure errors…and yes even in this digital age it’s important. A typo one can understand but you really have no room to comment on anyone’s intelligence.

i am glad that you only responded to an obvious typo and did not respond at all to the basis of my argument. I will assume that means that you concede i am correct.

Sorry, i wasnt a physics major. I was just a lowly history major who then went on to get a law degree and made a small typo in a comment to a blog post. I am ashamed, as are my friends and family, at my error. it clearly reflects on my level of education.

the only reason i mentioned the law degree is because i thought you were attacking my education with the “a physics major are we?” quip. meaning i thought you were claiming i must not have a major that deals with lots of writing if i made a typo. I misunderstood. Fair enough. My mistake.

but you dont need a physics education to know that when you are falling forward, you dont kick your leg backwards. you place it forwards to try to catch yourself. also, if you look carefully, he does a very slight jump to do his forward roll. pretty good body control for someone “accidentally” kicking their leg back.

and you are not going to convince me it was an accident, as i am not going to convince you it was intentional. so, we are at an impasse, and rather than resort to insults (as these conversation normally do) im going to stop wasting my time on it.

His left foot is in the air at the moment in question. He puts his right foot down with clear intent. The question is why ?
His left foot is off the ground because he wants to avoid contact with Parker’s head, that is obvious.
At this point he is pushed by Modric.
I believe that he wants to gain solid contact with the ground to be able to accelerate to take part in further action.
An intentional kick to Parker’s head as violent conduct is a ridiculous interpretation.
I personally would leave The league after such an unfounded accusation.

More importantly: I am sure that I am not the only one with this point of view. How come that all articles offered by google are anti Balotelli ? It is a distorted reality, it is a sickening witch hunt.

this is the guy who gets it. if you look past all the sensationalism and take a look at the video objectively, you will see that there is more evidence supporting the view point that it was not an intentional stamp.
Forget his history and look at the 3 players involved. At worst, he stamped/kicked out in anger but there is no way he could have known that the players head was there

the reason that ive heard on the radio is that its because the ref was showed the footage and said he wouldnt have given a red for it and thus the FA couldnt retroactively ban crouch. so while i agree that the FA is screwed up and hypocritical, they couldnt take action on this specific incident. the whole situation is screwed up (i do think crouch deserves to be banned for that, and i like crouch) and this whole review process needs to be reworked.

He raised his hand in a clear attempt to scratch, claw or gouge because he missed they eye does not make it OK. That is as clear a case of violent conduct as you will see. What can be his excuse for his actions? What yellow does it come under? Unsporting behaviour. Dissent by word or action. Persistent infringement of the Laws of the Game. Delaying the restart of play. Failure to respect the required distance when play is restarted with a corner kick, free kick or throw-in. Entering or re-entering the field of play without the referee’s permission or deliberately leaving the field of play without the referee’s permission? These are the 7 yellow card offences. None of them cover it do they? Violent conduct does and that’s exactly what it was you cannot raise your hands to another player as he did angry (he was) or not, that’s what Crouch did on that there is no argument! You can’t say well he didn’t hurt him to much in the end as that irrelevant as most VC reds don’t hurt anybody.

Nelson
save your breath the thug listens to nobody because nobody as ever stood up to him.his talent has always bailed him out one day his talent will wane and it will be a rude awakening.good luck thug you will need it.